Bulldogs win two of three against eastern foes in Lander

The Lovell Bulldogs got a chance to see some top teams from the Class 3A East over the weekend at the Lander Classic and came away with two wins in three games including an epic battle against Douglas.

Coming in ranked number one at 3-0, the Bullldogs went toe to toe with second-ranked Douglas Friday. Douglas prevailed 72-70. Saturday, the Bulldogs clobbered third-ranked Wheatland 59-44 and Burns 82-37.

 “Overall, I was pleased with how we played,” coach Shane Durtsche said. “These early tournaments are a chance to get some games in to be used as a barometer for where we’re at and what we need to work on while getting as good of competition as we can so we get good tests.

“We only get to see these (east) teams once a year unless we see them in Casper (at State). In my short tenure (as Lovell head coach) we’ve played Douglas two of the three years at State and Wheatland all three years, so there’s a good chance we’ll see one of those teams or both again.”

Douglas 72, Lovell 70

The Bulldogs ran into a red hot Bearcat team in the first round Friday that hit 11 three-pointers in the game, seven by junior Kaden Capp, who came into the game averaging 5.7 points per game.

“He hit his first seven threes (before missing one),” Durtsche said. “He wasn’t a kid we were concerned about. We adjusted but were still a little late on a couple of them, but others were contested. I think they were over 50 percent from three.”

Capp finished with 23 points, and the leading scorer for the Cats was senior Collin Roberts at 25 points, who Durtsche called “their best player, a heck of a basketball player,” adding, “Capp was icing. We weren’t expecting him to hit seven threes. We kept thinking, ‘Let’s weather this storm.’ Douglas’ biggest lead was maybe 6 points.”

Lovell led 22-21 at the end of a high-scoring first quarter as senior Owen Walker scored 13 points. Lovell outscored Douglas 17-14 in the second quarter to lead 39-35 at halftime, but Douglas won the third period 19-15 to tie the score 54-54 despite a trio of treys in the quarter by Kaeson Anderson.

“They came out shooting lights out, but we hung in there and built as much as an eight-point lead in the second half until Roberts hit back-to-back contested threes to cut our lead to two,” Durtsche said.

Later, Lovell led 70-67 in the final two minutes and had the ball. Coming out of a time out, the coach said, the Bulldogs got the look they wanted but didn’t execute. Capp drained his third trey of the quarter to tie the score for Douglas with about a minute and a half left.

The Bulldogs executed the ensuing play better but missed the shot with just under a minute left. Douglas held the ball, then air-balled a three-pointer, Durtsche said, which fell into a Douglas player’s hand. There was a scramble, and Durtsche said he thought his team had possession, but Douglas called time out, which was granted.

Lovell fouled Colton Peterson with 3.6 seconds left, and the senior hit both free throws. A final attempt by the Bulldogs didn’t come off well, and Durtsche took the blame, noting, “We haven’t worked on last-second stuff yet. I didn’t have us prepared for a last-second situation. It’s a learning thing for all of us.”

In the end, the coach looked back on a great high school basketball game.

“It was a heck of a basketball game,” he said. “We had some good moments, but we also left some stuff out there. It was a pretty high-level game for early in the year.”

Walker finished with 19 points for the Bulldogs, Anderson 18, Owen Edwards 13, Matthew Newman 10, Jaxen Clark and Kyle Wilson 4 each and Sam Mayes 2.

Lovell 59, Wheatland 44

The Saturday morning game against Wheatland was played at a much more deliberate pace, which is Wheatland’s style.

“Wheatland does a good job playing the game at their pace, and they play very good defense,” Durtsche said. “We definitely controlled the game, but it took us a while to pull away. They’re a very good basketball team and will be in Casper in March.”

Lovell built a 13-7 lead by the end of the first quarter, then edged Wheatland 17-15 in the second to lead 30-22 at halftime. Wheatland edged Lovell 16-15 in the third quarter, but Lovell pulled away in the fourth with a 14-6 advantage to win by 15.

Wheatland has a pair of all-state juniors in Tate Nichols and Jacob Miller, and Durtsche said Owen Edwards did a good job against Nichols, who finished with 3 points, while Miller scored 10 points “but had to work for them” against Anderson’s defense. Senior Cayden Neely led Wheatland with 12 points, and point guard Ty Foland added 9.

Durtsche said the Bulldogs didn’t have a great game offensively but scored enough to pull away.

“We were sloppy at times and didn’t take care of the basketball at times, but we wore them down,” he said. “Wheatland is a very experienced team that is always one of the better teams from the east.”

Walker finished with 16 points for the Bulldogs, Anderson 12, Edwards 11, Newman 10, Mayes 8 and Wilson 2.

Lovell 82, Burns 37

The Saturday afternoon finale was all Lovell after the first quarter, as the Bulldogs trailed 17-16 after one, then blew out the Broncs 32-7 in the second quarter to lead 48-24 at halftime. The Bulldogs continued to pour it on, outscoring Burns 19-7 in the third quarter and 15-6 in the fourth.

“We wanted to try something out, so we came out and ran a full-court, man-to-man run and jump press,” Durtsche said. “We wanted to look at it and see how we do. They hit a couple of threes when we lost our man, but we knew that would happen. In an early tournament, sometimes you put guys in situations and see how they handle it. 

“We went to a 1-3-1 zone and changed the game around with steals, traps and forcing tough, quick shots. The guys did a good job getting out in transition and up and down the floor. We had some fun in that one.”

Walker led the Bulldogs with 23 points, and Anderson added 21, Edwards 10, Newman 8, Cash Wassmer 6, Clark and Mayes 5 each and Joaquin Scheeler and Wilson 2 apiece.

Now 5-1, the Bulldogs will take a few days off, hold a shoot-around Friday, then practice Saturday and all next week.

They open the new year on Friday, Jan. 9, at Rocky Mountain, then travel to Cody Tuesday, Jan. 13, to open conference play. The Big Horn Basin Classic follows on January 16-17.